Bernie Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot:
“I woke up this morning thinking it was going to be another great day. I’ve been celebrating with friends, family and the community since I turned 90. I’ve told you about the gracious gift of $117 million that was collected and given in my honor to four charities that mean a lot to me. All that happiness blew up because I said in a newspaper interview that I have supported and will continue to support Donald Trump.
Boom!
Negative stories… vicious threats, without cause, to boycott the company that has enabled my foundation to give billions to support autism, medical research, education, heart and neurological issues like stroke, and to help our veterans. The company that I retired from in 2002 and have not had a business relationship with in almost 20 years. A company that has employed more than a half-million people. The people who work there are affiliated with both political parties or no party at all. They are of all religions and all colors and backgrounds. Why would people want to hurt them?
All because I give my voice and some of my money to our President. Am I in China? Argentina? Russia? That’s what it feels like to me.
It saddens me that our country has come to this, where I, as a private citizen, cannot express my feelings. It angers me and it saddens me, but it sure as hell is not going to stop me. If you thought it would, you’ve got the wrong guy.
In the next ten years, God willing, I will accomplish more to save this world than my critics will do even if they had forty lifetimes.”
Few people have Bernie Marcus-level resources, and also relatively few, I’m afraid, have the emotional strength necessary to stand up against a mob, even a mob whose attacks are (usually) strictly verbal. Most, I fear, will simply go along.
And no one should be under the illusion that the Gleichschaltung will “only” require you to personally refrain from expressing unapproved thoughts: it will also require you to denounce and shun your friends and colleagues who have dared to express such thoughts. See Lynchings and Witch-Trials, Technology-Enhanced:
A few weeks ago, shortly after I left my magazine gig, I had breakfast with a well-known Toronto man of letters. He told me his week had been rough, in part because it had been discovered that he was still connected on social media with a colleague who’d fallen into disfavour with Stupid Twitter-Land. “You know that we all can see that you are still friends with him,” read one of the emails my friend had received. “So. What are you going to do about that?”
“So I folded,” he told me with a sad, defeated air. “I know I’m supposed to stick to my principles. That’s what we tell ourselves. Free association and all that. It’s part of the romance of our profession. But I can’t afford to actually do that. These people control who gets jobs. I’m broke. So now I just go numb and say whatever they need me to say.”
Are there any among the current set of Democratic presidential candidates who see this kind of thing as a problem and who would provide even the most modest form of push-back against it?
This one’s easy. The answer is No. Any other questions?
Nope. The “war hero” woman pilot, who is conducting a suicide run against Mitch McConnell, lasted 3 hours after saying she might have voted for Kavanaugh.
Amy McGrath, a Democrat challenging Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R.) in Kentucky, quickly reversed herself Wednesday after an interview was published in which she said she’d “probably” have voted to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
McGrath, a former Marine aviator, made her comments during an interview with the Courier-Journal on Wednesday:
CJ: Did you think Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s accusation was credible?
McGrath: Yeah, I think it’s credible. I think this is ”” I think many Republicans thought it was credible. And ””
CJ: That wasn’t disqualifying then?
McGrath: Well, I mean I think again, I think it’s credible but given the amount of time that lapsed in between and from a judicial standpoint, I don’t think it would really disqualify him.
CJ: So you would have voted for him to be on the Supreme Court?
McGrath: You know, I think that with Judge Kavanaugh, yeah, I probably would have voted for him.
The Courier-Journal published the story online at 4:02 p.m. and McGrath was widely criticized on the left. By 7:30 p.m., she had reversed her position on Kavanaugh, who was confirmed by the Senate last year but remains a target among the Democratic base.
“Upon further reflection and further understanding of his record, I would have voted no,” she tweeted.
Democrat war hero.
Hickenlooper. Not a fan but he’s not insane either. As such, he’s toast.
Are there any among the current set of Democratic presidential candidates who see this kind of thing as a problem and who would provide even the most modest form of push-back against it?
No.Denouncing those who disagree with you- and even doxxing them- has become standard Democrat behavior. Unfortunately, what happened to Bernie Marcus is far from unique. As some have pointed out, after Hillary lost in 2016, the far left became more powerful in the Democrat Party. Ironic that in 2008 I voted for Hillary in the 2008 TX primary because she was “moderate.”
Which is why I neither wear a MAGA cap nor have any bumperstickers on my car.
Are there any current Democrat presidential candidates who denounce Anfifa? I doubt it.
Is not wearing a MAGA cap cowardliness, or rational safety precaution?
I live here in suburban NY and I will not wear the hat and certainly never when out with family. It’s viewed as outright provocation and comparatively worse than a scantily dressed young woman.
1) We are past the point where public expressions of support or opposition to a politician are no longer allowed.
2) That does not mean that support or opposition does not exist, just that it may not be expressed peacefully.
3) Eventually, it will be expressed, irrevocably.
Subotai Bahadur
“First They Came for the Jews”
By Pastor Niemoller
First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.
Note the commonality:
“I did not speak out”
Having an expressed opinion at odds with ANTIFA, Democrats, LBGTQXYZKLMNOP, AGW alarmists, etc can lead to consequences, from assault to loss of ones income.
Free speech is not as free as it was under several previous administrations, and it was then the administration that was the thumb on the scale. Today it is independent, though interlinked, groups of the Left who act to interdict free speech.
“Free speech for me but not for thee” is the apparent rule of the day.
I have no solution.
tomw
Amanda S Green, at Sarah Hoyt’s blog:
https://accordingtohoyt.com/2019/07/12/fear-by-amanda-s-green-a-blast-from-the-past-from-september-2017/
“…I neither wear a MAGA cap nor have any bumperstickers on my car.”
—Gringo
Mess with the enemy’s heads, #LazyTrumpists. Step out in public wearing one of those giant Nike swoosh T-shirts topped with a MAGA cap on your head.
I’m thinking of going to the faculty club parking lot or any other place leftists hang out and placing Trump 2020 stickers on every other car (so the victims will suspect the owners of the cars left untouched). I will use good glue making them hard to remove.
It’s already past the point of no return. No country can survive what Democrats are doing to the US. But I do hope to take some comfort from the number of establishment politician’s heads destined to be put on pikes and carried through the streets by Antifa black-shirts. Pelosi, sure, but what about Shumer? Nor should members of GOP Inc leadership be excluded from the frivolities.
Will any dem candidate speak against it? No, it’s what they’ve been working for, for many years. Only one voice is acceptable.
The extra fun part is all the progtards blowing up over this are demanding people boycott Home Depot and go to Lowe’s. But Lowe’s gives more to Republicans than it does to Democrats.
HA!
Their stupidity would be funny if it weren’t so damn dangerous.
“….Which is why I neither wear a MAGA cap nor have any bumperstickers on my car…..”
That goes for me as well. I live in Austin, and would never dare to have a bumpersticker or a MAGA cap. Why start trouble? I do, however, vote.
Prof. Ryszard Legutko in his excellent book “The Demon in Democracy-Totalitarian Temptations in Free Societies” thoroughly explains the phenomenon. FRIGHTENING!
}}} it will also require you to denounce and shun your friends and colleagues who have dared to express such
Ask someone like Neo-neocon how much crap she gets for it. :-/
}}} Are there any among the current set of Democratic presidential candidates who see this kind of thing as a problem and who would provide even the most modest form of push-back against it?
Oh, HELL no. Every single one of them will support it. Except for Biden, who will support whatever way the wind blows, which means he’ll support it.
}}} McGrath, a former Marine aviator
Clearly promoted and enabled in her career by her gender, not her talent or her innate “Marine”hood.
}}} Which is why I neither wear a MAGA cap nor have any bumperstickers on my car.
MAGA caps are old hat. Now you need to wear a MOBA cap:
M ake
O ccasio-Cortez
B artend
A gain.
MOBA
:-D
}}} We are past the point where public expressions of support or opposition to a politician are no longer allowed.
Nope. Only support on the Right. You can support any obnoxious BS from the Left (Che, Socialism, NAMBLA, Late-Term Abortion) and, while you might get a passing sneer or even a yell in the wrong places, you won’t be struck from behind, spit on, or thrown out of a restaurant. The Right is still somewhat civil. I would bet you could wear a Che shirt in a random bar in Mobile and not get the crap beat out of you.
}}} I have no solution.
}}} tomw
The shooting, when it begins, will fix it. But what happens when the smoke clears, well, that’s going to be… “interesting”, in the apocryphal Chinese curse sense of the term.
}}} I’m thinking of going to the faculty club parking lot or any other place leftists hang out and placing Trump 2020 stickers on every other car (so the victims will suspect the owners of the cars left untouched). I will use good glue making them hard to remove.
Make sure you wear latex gloves for all handling… ;-)
}}} That goes for me as well. I live in Austin, and would never dare to have a bumpersticker or a MAGA cap. Why start trouble? I do, however, vote.
Yeah, but Austin is a lefty hellhole, with both UT and the state government in it. While TX has gotten too many lefty invaders in the last decade, Austin is just pure liberal nutjobs.